Just Around the Corner

Ah, July! You are already half-past. How did you manage to roll-on-by so quickly? I’ve hardly had a moment to think about what I’d like to do during the “summer” and here we are looking toward the first days of August. In my mind, I have always thought of August as the Sunday evenings of my former work days. Sundays would be a misery because Monday, back at the grindstone, was only a few moments away. This evening we’ve agreed, LOML and I, we’ll just sit tight during the summer months and not really try to have a summer adventure. We’ve decided to give the tourists and fun-seekers a wide berth. It’s hardly worth the huge headache and hassle to be heading into a retail shop or grocery store anytime between Wednesday evening and Sunday morning, let alone try to get a day-pass to a provincial park or to snag a camping permit. City folks, who are so anxious to break away from their every workaday moments, have descended upon the County—in droves. Oh, I know the County is a tourist destination but, I can’t remember a time in my 49 years as a County resident having seen such a crush of visitors.

Like a lot of you, I’ve become very savvy about when exactly I can venture out to grocery shop, visit the hardware store and pharmacy without standing in a line waiting for the numbers inside the stores to drop. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good line-up as much as the next person, but I’ve never needed Chinese Five Spice, or a bag of marshmallows so badly I’d be willing to stand in the blazing sun for 20 minutes to get to the goods. When I do have to “go in” I wait until that magic time when holidayers are least likely to be out-and-about. Early morning seems to be a good time. And I do mean “early”. Those who are living out their holidays in a tent in a campground aren’t likely to make it into town anytime before eleven in the morning. I know from experience, preparing a meal on a campfire or camp stove takes a whole lot of concentration and is time consuming. The clean-up, which is absolutely necessary (pests, you know) takes a bundle of time when one has to heat washing-up water first. Then there’s the matter of airing the sleeping bags, storing the food someplace safe from the critters and brushing the pine needles out of your hair, so you don’t look like a camper when you do hit the shops. Of course, the smell of bug spray and campfire always gives a person away. Those tourists who aren’t living the dream in a tent, and actually are staying in roofed accommodations, won’t venture out until they’ve ploughed through the breakfast buffet and the cafes are open. Yep, early, early morning is the time to pick up the Shreddies and two per cent. It’s as much fun as midnight shopping used to be.

Ah, July. Here today. Gone tomorrow, or on the thirty-first around midnight. Between now and the day the snow flies, I might make time to set-up the air conditioners, or not. I might visit the lumber yard to pick materials to do some repairs to the “barn” door—that’s been on my to-do list for five years. I might take an afternoon to de-rust and repaint the kiddies’ Tonka Trucks for Alfred the Early. I might gather up my collection of sneakers and decide I don’t really need to have seven pairs taking up shoe rack space. I might clean the refrigerator—gag. I know I’ll make an effort to fill the rest of my summer days with hikes on the Trail, cycling with LOML, day-tripping, baking and solving murders on the side porch. I know I don’t feel like I want to rub elbows with the people travelling to get away from their everyday Monday-to-Friday lives, by being here in the County. I might give tourist directions to “a good place for lunch,” but I know I won’t give them directions to “my good place for lunch”. I might tell a tourist how to get to the Glenora Ferry, but I might tell them about the possibility of horrendous queues. I might be a good host, with a smile on my face, but it might be a sly smile. Sometimes the long way around the County is the best way around the County.

Enjoy the abundance of July! August is just around the corner.